The Mediterranean like the Caribbean, with sea temperatures over 30 degrees. This is the scenario described in an analysis developed by the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC), which recounts how surface temperatures in the Mediterranean basin are currently hotter than usual, reaching levels up to 5-6 degrees above the July climatological average of the last thirty years.
It is – it is explained – a “marine heatwave (Mhw)” which was “observed in July and is now expanding eastward across the Mediterranean Sea”. The phenomenon has affected “the Gulf of Taranto and is expected to intensify in the coming weeks”.
Marine heat waves – it is noted – occur when “ocean temperatures exceed an extreme threshold with seasonal variability for more than five days in a row. Since 11 July 2023, a heat wave has hit the Gulf of Taranto, where the surface water temperature has reached a peak of 30 degrees. Now temperatures are expected to “reach 32 degrees in some areas” including “between Southern Italy and North Africa”.
Last year – it is pointed out – “a marine heat wave of record proportions in the Mediterranean Sea had hit the Ligurian Sea for three weeks”, and “subsequently the Gulf of Taranto with greater intensity, reaching almost 5 degrees above average”.
From the simulations it emerges that «we currently find ourselves in a condition in which the average temperature of the sea surface in the Mediterranean is around 28 degrees and it is expected that it will continue to rise in the coming days, reaching over 30 degrees. Since the beginning of July we have observed a positive trend in sea surface temperature increase, normal for summer conditions in mid-July this temperature increase turned out to be an anomaly because the sea surface temperature exceeded the climatological threshold of the month, calculated in the last 30 years, for more than five consecutive days.